


The Studio

by Ghelik



Series: The 100 Fics [19]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fashion & Models, Alternate Universe - Photographer, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-05
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-09-22 07:07:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9590051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghelik/pseuds/Ghelik
Summary: Ok. No money. Not food. His bills are due and he doesn’t have any jobs in sight, because Karma fucking hates his guts.Maybe it's time to swallow his pride and ask for help...He rubs his face with both hands and curses. He’s a good curser. He’d be fucking rich if that could be monetized in any way.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Twitter Prompt by @Luisasource:  
> MemoriAU when Murphy is a photographer and Emori is his model.

“What do you mean you don’t have the pieces?”  
The teen behind the counter tries a customer-friendly-smile and Murphy nearly looses it. He closes his fist against the counter. “I am really sorry”, says the boy and Murphy has to count to ten not to throttle him, “but they just don’t make pieces for this model anymore.”

He looks around the small store. It’s the tenth camera-shop he’s been to in the last two days. He’s had to drive all the way over from Arkadia to get here, just on the off-chance that they stoked the needed pieces. 

Murphy points at a camera on display inside a glass cabinet. “It’s that exact model.”  
“That is an antique. It’s for display purposes only.”  
Murphy narrows his eyes. “Is it empty?”  
The boy twists his hands. “No.”  
“How much do you want for it?”

He checks the price tag and whistles low and impressed. Murphy bites his lower lip.  
He is not the sentimental type, and to spend so much money only to dismantle the camera and take out the pieces he needs is really not a smart move. But…

But this had been his father’s camera. It was his first camera. And it isn’t fancy or anything, but it did its job and he has repaired it with his own two hands a hundred times. He can’t give up on it just yet. 

With a heavy sigh, knowing he is acting very stupidly, he fishes his credit card out of his pocket.  
“I am so going to regret this.”

 

It doesn’t take long to start regretting it. Thirty-three hours, to be exact, when he checks his bank account and has to fight the urge to bash his own brains in. The dismantled camera sits innocently on his workbench like it hasn’t made a substantial dent in his savings. 

He rubs his face with both hands and curses. 

He wanders over to the fridge, opens it and curses again. He’s a good curser. He’d be fucking rich if that could be monetized in any way. 

Ok. No money. Not food. His bills are due and he doesn’t have any jobs in sight, because Karma fucking hates his guts. 

He could go back to working retail, he muses. Then promptly has to fight back the wave of nausea and splash some water on his face. He looks at his face on the mirror. His hair is getting too long again, falling into his eyes. The long nose and clear eyes he got from his father. That and the camera are the only things he has from his dad. 

Speaking of which, his mum’s hospital bills are due, too. And the last thing he wants is for her to show up at his door. Which will happen at some point. Probably in the most awkward and inconvenient moment, because his mum hate’s him more than Karma does, and the two of them are in league to make his life miserable.  
He heaves a sigh. 

Fishes his phone out of his back pocket and worries his lip some more. 

 

It takes him nearly a week and a half more to hit rock-bottom. He’s been staring at his phone non-stop for at least three hours when he finally unlocks the screen and scrolls through his contacts. Murphy is tempted to just hang up, but he doesn’t have time. On the second tone a deep vibrating voice barks “Blake.”

Murphy hasn’t talked to him for three years and it takes him a moment to swallow the knot in the back of his throat enough to answer. “Hey, Bellamy.”

There is a moment of silence on the other side.  
They are not really friends, have never been. But they were together in the war and bonded over blood and pain when they were sent back: him with a fucked up leg, Bellamy with a missing hand. They saw each other a few times in rehab. 

“Murphy?”  
Their relationship was… Murphy has no idea what it was. But the last time they saw each other Bellamy told him to give him a call if he ever needed anything. 

“The one and only.”  
On the other side Bellamy laughs, deep and vibrant and it nearly takes him back to nights camped out by their jeep. Bellamy had looked after everyone on their squad like some sort of over-protective gruff dad. 

“How have you been?”  
Murphy really didn’t want to let him down. Bellamy was the one to say he should pursue his dream of being a photographer. Said he did amazing pictures. 

“Around. Doing this and that.”

“I saw the expo two years ago. Really cool stuff.”

His chest shouldn’t well up with pride at Bellamy’s words. It shouldn’t matter to him what Bellamy fucking Blake thinks of his art. 

Murphy clears his throat. “Listen, Bellamy”, he says, trying not to look at his reflection on the window. “I need a favor.”

“Anything.”  
That fucking man... Why does he have to be such a selfless man? 

Murphy doesn’t like selfless and helpful people. As a rule doesn’t trust them. The last time he blindly put his faith on a human being he ended up so scarred he enlisted and went to war for a few tours. Blake doesn’t make it easy not to trust. “Does your wife still have the agency?”

Bellamy snorts. “Why you want to switch to modeling?”  
“I’ll let you know, asshole, I’d be an amazing model.”  
“Yeah, right.”  
Murphy rolls his eyes. “You’re just jealous.”  
“Of what? You pasty skin or the skinny ass?”  
“I have a great ass, I’ll let you know. It’s a widely known fact”

He’s missed this sort of easy banter. He shouldn’t have pulled away, maybe they could be friends. Or, not friends, but… Something like that.  
“Anyway. Does she still have the agency?”  
“Yes she does.”  
“Would she be interested in a photographer?”  
There is a moment of silence. Then rustling like Bellamy’s sitting up. “I thought you didn’t want to become a studio photographer.”

“Yeah, well, I like eating too much to be picky at the moment.” He licks his lips. This feels dangerous. Like he’s giving away far too much. 

Murphy’d rather not give anybody anything that could be used as ammo against him. But… Well… Desperate times and all that. 

When Bellamy speaks again there is a definite edge to his voice that makes Murphy feel both nervous and extremely safe.  
“Consider it set.”

 

The first time Murphy touched a camera he was six years old, sitting on his father’s lap and looking at birds through the tiny viewfinder. There weren’t many happy moments in his childhood, but all of them include a camera. His dad taught him about lenses, focus, apertures, chemicals to develop his work and stuff like that. The last present he ever gave him was his very own camera. Then he died and Murphy’s childhood went down the drain. 

He knew he wanted to be a photographer even before he knew there was a profession that let you live of your photos. Not that he’s living of photos just yet. He’s done a few expos, won a few prizes, nothing too fancy. He sold some of his war-photos to magazines and newspaper to make an extra buck. But he despises models and studios with the fake light and the photoshop. He can proudly say that none of his photos have been digitally altered. Not that he hasn’t tampered with the developing of some of his more ‘abstract’ works.  
But those are private, so. Yeah. 

He arrives at the studio two days later and is greeted by Bellamy’s wife, whose name he only remembers because it’s Superman’s name – what sort of parents see their little baby girl and go: ‘yep, that’s clearly a Clark’? She has a soft oval of a face and golden hair pulled back into a serious-person bun. She’s dressed all business like in a blue pant-suit with a silk white blouse that hides her pregnant belly pretty good. Does nothing to hide her amazing cleavage, but the bun in the oven is concealed –ish. He has an eye fro detail. 

“Murphy”, her smile is business-like also. As attempts to hide how much she dislikes him it’s not a bad one. They sake hands. “This way. Did you find it ok?”

“Yep”, he says popping the p just to annoy her. He does not deal well with people. Which is another great reason why he doesn’t do studio. Inside a studio there’s always a lot of people running around. A lot of social interaction he could live without. And models. He really could live without talking to a model. His last experience was… Not great. But…. Again, he likes to eat. And Clarke agreed to pay him in advance. 

“Over here. We have set most of the lights already.” She looks over her shoulder at him, stopping in front of a metal door marked with number seventeen. “The crew is not very big for this one and once you have everything set you can send them on their way.” She licks her lips and adds. “And Miller will be right there. In case you need anything.”

Clarke opens the door. It’s like any other studio he’s been to. A rack of lights illuminating a set decorated like a sitting room with white walls and plush leather grandfather seats, very 1920’s. It takes him a moment to tear his eyes from the room, and bring himself to look around the room. 

There’s a woman with a brace on her left leg at a control table and a pair obviously flirting while holding reflectors. A dude that clearly looks like a bodyguard sits by the far wall playing on his phone.

It takes him a moment to notice that Clarke is looking at him and he feels like she knows about… Well… What happened to him the last time he was in a photo studio. He’d rather she didn’t. 

“Everything ok?”

Murphy clears his throat. “Yeah. So who am I supposed to photograph?” Clarke smiles at him. “Emori!”, she calls and a woman in a long evening gown strides into the room. She has the train of her dress draped over an arm, wears long gloves up to her elbows and her long hair in a complicated up-do. Her cheekbones look like they could cut, they are so sharp, and her eyes are the loveliest shade of brown he’s ever seen. 

A flurry of make-up artists and costume designers set her like a doll on the set, arranging the train around her legs, touching up her makeup. 

“Ok, people!” calls Clarke. “This is John Murphy. He’s our photographer for today. Murphy, meet Raven” that’s the woman at the control panel “Monty and Harper”, the pair flirting. “Magda and her crew. They’ll be out of your hair as soon as Emori is set” the model winks at him, her smirk doing things to him he shouldn’t be feeling.  
He has a very bad feeling about this. 

“And”, Clarke continues, oblivious to his discomfort “that’s Miller. He’ll keep an eye out.” 

“’S’up!” says the bodyguard sitting against the far wall and playing on his phone. 

 

He has to admit it is not completely terrible. Emori has the ability to freeze in a position for hours without complaining, or moving, changing her expression or anything. The crew is ok. They seem to be under instructions to leave him alone and do so happily. 

Murphy has a tendency of talking to himself while taking pictures. He developed it early on, when he was thirteen or fourteen years old and he only had his camera to talk to, and, since he didn’t usually take pictures with an audience, never felt the need to stop. It feels unnatural to take a picture in complete silence. He can’t get in the right mood, loose himself in the job without the low thrum of his voice in the background. 

That’s probably why he doesn’t notice he’s whispering “God, you’re exquisite” while taking a close-up of Emori, until she answers “You’re not bad yourself.”

And he nearly drops the camera. She looks at him through her lashes and he takes the picture without meaning to, it’s just… 

People don’t look at him like that. And he understands she’s probably just acting – that’s what models are supposed to do – but. But he hasn’t seen a model looking so earnest and sweet and cocky all at the same time. 

Most of the models he’s seen look like dead-eyed zombies, usually pouty or with slightly open lips. He isn’t sure if that’s supposed to look sexy or something, but he finds it fucking annoying. 

 

“Can you touch your face?” he asks changing the angle.  
They’re on their seventh session and he’s running out of ideas to capture her in new ways. Not that he wouldn’t gladly spend the rest of his days just taking pictures of her. But he guesses Clarke won’t just want plain old profiles of her sitting demurely on a sofa. 

Emori raises one of her gloved hand, to brush her cheek. “Could you use the other hand?” he asks. “The shadows look weird with this one.”

Emori stares at him like he just insulted his great-aunt. One of the make-up artists rushes over to him. “It’s on the contract that her right hand will not be photographed.”

Murphy frowns. “Why the hell not?”, he blurts out in one of his – admittedly – not finest moments, but it seems like such an arbitrary rule.  
“We’re done for today”, she growls, stands up and rushes out of the room in a flurry of skirts. Murphy blinks after her, not sure what just happened. 

 

The Dropship is his favorite dive-bar. Has been for many years, Gina, the bartender, greets him with a crooked smile and a beer. The beer is shitty and the stools sticky, but the fries are the best he’s had anywhere – not that he’s a gourmet or anything – and the pizza is half decent. 

He’s spent five hours developing and the low light of the Dropship is exactly what he needs to adjust his eyes to the light outside of his dark-room. He munches on the fries feeling sitting on his usual booth, people watching.

There is a couple snuggling on the corner and he takes a picture without even thinking about it. At home he has half a thousand pictures taken in the Dropship of random strangers, of light angles he thought were cool, wood patterns and stained glasses. 

Murphy’s so engrossed in the couple across the bar, that he doesn’t notice the woman standing at his side until she raps her knuckles against the table, making him jump nearly a foot in the air. 

“That seat taken?”, asks Emori smiling sheepishly at him.  
She isn’t wearing any makeup, her hair is loosely braided. Even in a loose college sweater and jeans she manages to look stunning. “All yours”, he says and takes a swing of his beer, his mouth bone-dry, fingers itching to take a picture. Murphy sets the camera down. 

Which is a pity, because when she sits across from him, the light highlights her cheekbones just right and those shadows are precious against her throat. 

“I wanted to apologize” she says looking down. Only her left hand is on the table. The long fingers drawing patterns on the condensation of her beer. And he wants to photograph her hands, too. 

“For what?”

 

“For walking out like that” she’s blushing. She shouldn’t bite her bottom lip like that. It’s positively sinful. “I really don’t want to be that kind of model, you know? All diva like and stuff. It’s just…”

She trails off and he’s not sure what he should do. Prompt her to keep talking? Say something encouraging? Tell her she’s not diva-like? 

Murphy is not made to be supportive.  
“My right hand is a delicate subject.”  
“Why you have an extra finger or something?”

Emori stares at him and he would bang his head against the table. That was probably tactless or something like that. He takes another swing of his beer, just to complete the asshole image he seems to be cultivating. “Something like that.” And her voice is tart and ice-cold. She’s ready to leave, he can sense it. 

And when she leaves she probably have him fired or something. Or maybe not fired, but she won’t work with him anymore. And… Murphy really doesn’t want that. 

“I’m sure it’s not that bad.”

Her stare is icy. Then, very deliberately she rises her right hand and pulls on the glove with the left one. 

It’s not… her most pretty feature. The fingers are freaky, the form is all random, and the skin is a few shades paler than the rest of her – probably due to her having that hand covered all the time. 

“That’s pretty badass” he says, because he cannot think of anything better to say. Tearing his eyes away from it is easier than he though it would be. Murphy pushes the fries towards her, the small basket bumping against her right hand. “Want some?”

Emori stares at him like she can’t believe him. She goes to cover her right hand, but Murphy must be feeling bold today, because his own hand shoots out and lands lightly on hers. The skin feels dry and coarse under his fingers. He gives her a squeeze before putting his hand down on the table. 

When she picks up a fry and takes it to her lips, her smile, her slight blush high on her cheekbones, the twinkle in her eye, it’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

**Author's Note:**

> This hasn't been beta'd  
> Thanks for reading


End file.
